Evaluation of 3D Steel Moment Frames under Earthquake

Excitations. II: Reliability and Redundancy

Kuo-Wei Liao1; Yi-Kwei Wen2; and D. A. Foutch3

Abstract: In NEHRP 2003, a new mechanism-based reliability/redundancy factor, ␳, is proposed to replace the current ␳ factor in
building codes. A multiplier of ␳ = 1.3 for design lateral force is recommended for structures deemed being lack of redundancy. The effects
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of detailed structural configurations, nonlinear structural behaviors, and uncertainty in demand and capacity, however, have not been
considered in this factor. To examine the adequacy of this new factor, a systematic investigation on the above effects is carried out. It
focuses on buildings with 5 ⫻ 5 bays and nine different configurations of special moment resisting frames. The nonlinear structural
response behaviors and uncertainty in demand and capacity based on a three-dimensional 共3D兲 incremental dynamic analysis are properly
considered. Structural reliability and redundancy are determined. The biaxial spectral acceleration is found to be a more effective predictor
of system demand than drift and therefore used as the response measure in the analysis of reliability and redundancy. A uniform-risk
redundancy factor, RR, for design lateral force is proposed to provide equal reliability for buildings of different degrees of redundancy.
This RR factor is compared with the ␳ factor and areas for improvement of the latter are pointed out.
DOI: 10.1061/共ASCE兲0733-9445共2007兲133:3共471兲
CE Database subject headings: Reliability; Earthquakes; Seismic design; Building codes; Frames.

Introduction
The importance of structural redundancy has been long recog-
nized by the structural engineers. Structural redundancy under
earthquakes became the focus of research only after the 1994
Northridge and 1995 Kobe earthquakes 共e.g., Whittaker et al.
1999; Bertero and Bertero 1999; Wen and Song 2003兲 and the
benefit of redundancy in enhancing the structural performance has
been generally recognized. The definition and interpretation of
structural redundancy, however, vary significantly and remain
controversial. In view of the complicated nonlinear structural be-
haviors under random earthquake excitations and the uncertainty
in demand and capacity, redundancies of structures under seismic
loads can be measured meaningfully only in terms of reliability of
structural system against specified limit states.
A reliability/redundancy factor, ␳, introduced in NEHRP
共1997兲, UBC 共1997兲, and IBC 共ICBO 2000兲 is used as a multiplier
of the lateral design earthquake load. This factor takes into ac-
1
Assistant Professor of Civil Engineering, Tamkang Univ., E725, 151
Ying-chuan Rd., Tamsui, Taipei, Taiwan; formerly, Research Assistant,
Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801. E-mail:
liao0121@mail.tku.edu.tw
2
Professor of Civil Engineering, Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-
Champaign, 3129e Newmark Civil Engineering Laboratory, 205 N.
Mathews Ave., Urbana, IL 61801. E-mail: y-wen@uiuc.edu
3
Professor of Civil Engineering, Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-
Champaign, 3129b Newmark Civil Engineering Laboratory, 205 N.
Mathews Ave., Urbana, IL 61801. E-mail: d-foutch@uiuc.edu
Note. Associate Editor: Panos Tsopelas. Discussion open until August
1, 2007. Separate discussions must be submitted for individual papers. To
extend the closing date by one month, a written request must be filed with
the ASCE Managing Editor. The manuscript for this paper was submitted
for review and possible publication on June 10, 2005; approved on July
31, 2006. This paper is part of the Journal of Structural Engineering,
Vol. 133, No. 3, March 1, 2007. ©ASCE, ISSN 0733-9445/2007/3-471–
480/$25.00.
count only the floor area and the maximum element-story shear
ratio. Recent research has shown that it can lead to inconsistent
reliability and poor designs 共e.g., Wen and Song 2003; Searer and
Freeman 2002兲. A new reliability/redundancy factor was recom-
mended in NEHRP 共2003兲 and adopted in ASCE-7 共2005兲. This
new ␳ factor is primarily a function of the number of moment
frames in the direction of earthquake excitation force. Structural
systems are classified into redundant or nonredundant with a uni-
form penalty factor of 1.3 on lateral design force imposed on the
latter. The new reliability/redundancy factor is more mechanism-
based, however, the uniform penalty on lateral design force fails
to account for the large differences in configuration within each
classification and obviously could still lead to poor designs. Also,
other important factors such as ductile versus brittle connection
behavior, uncertainty in demand and capacity, irregular configu-
ration, biaxial and torsion effects all have been found to have
significant influence on the performance of buildings but have not
been considered.
The important factors mentioned above are examined system-
atically in this study. Past research is first reviewed. The
reliability/redundancy factors defined in NEHRP 1997 and 2003
are then discussed and compared with the 1 / RR factor proposed in
this study. Nine steel moment frame buildings with different plane
configurations are designed and their reliabilities and redundan-
cies compared using the method of analysis in the companion
paper. A regression analysis of the 1 / RR factor on number of
moment frames and stories is also carried out for possible appli-
cation of the results in code procedures. The dependence of RR
factor on the excitation intensity measures such as the commonly
used first mode or first two modes spectral accelerations and the
contribution of the second mode are examined. The most appro-
priate intensity measure is selected and used in the fragility analy-
ses and limit state probability analyses of the buildings.

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J. Struct. Eng. 2007.133:471-480.

 Previous Research
De et al. 共1989兲 and Gollwitzer and Rackwitz 共1990兲 have con-
ducted extensive studies on the redundancy of simple parallel
systems with random capacity under random static loads. They
found that the redundancy of a system can be improved by using
a larger number of members with a low strength correlation
among the members, a small ratio of variability of load to mem-
ber resistance and adequate member ductility capacity.
Bertero and Bertero 共1999兲 utilized the concept of the redun-
dancy degree, defined as the number of plastic hinges of the struc-
tural system that fails when the structure collapses, to investigate
the redundancy of frame structures in static and dynamic analy-
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ses. They found that a reduction in the structural response
modification factor R due to redundancy cannot be established
independently of the overstrength and ductility of the system.
However, they did not suggest a method to incorporate redun-
dancy into structural design procedures.
Whittaker et al. 共1999兲 used the reliability index 共e.g., Ang and
Tang 1984兲 to measure the redundancy of structures under deter-
ministic earthquake excitations. They found that the benefit of
structural redundancy depends on the strength and stiffness cor-
relations of the components. Further, they were highly critical of
the NEHRP 1997 ␳ factor. They proposed four lines of strength-
and deformation-compatible vertical seismic framing in each
principle direction of a building as the minimum requirement for
adequate redundancy.
Wang and Wen 共2000兲 developed a smooth hysteretic model of
the moment-rotation relationship of brittle connections of pre-
Northridge steel buildings. In addition, a uniform-risk redundancy
factor was proposed to calculate the required design base-shear
force for structures of different degrees of redundancy to satisfy a
uniform reliability requirement. Wen and Song 共2003兲 investi-
gated the redundancy of special moment resisting frames 共SMRF兲
in terms of the system reliability under SAC ground motions. The
study included three-dimensional 共3D兲 ductile SMRF of three and
nine stories and equal floor area and strength, with a different
numbers of bays and different beam and column sizes.
Husain and Tsopelas 共2004兲 proposed two indices, a redun-
dancy strength index and a redundancy variation index to quantify
the effects of redundancy on structural systems. Based on these
two indices, the redundancy response modification factor 共RR兲
and reliability index 共␤兲 were derived. Several important factors
such as building height, number of stories, beam span lengths,
and vertical lines of resistance are investigated 共Tsopelas and
Husain 2004兲. Since only static pushover analysis is used, further
evaluation of structural redundancy considering dynamic
responses is needed.
Although the preceding research examined several important
factors that affect building redundancy, the effects of other factors
such as irregular plane configuration, role of gravity frames and
the behavior of post-Northridge connections remain unclear and
need to be investigated for performance evaluation and design of
buildings.
Reliability/Redundancy Factors in Building Codes
In NEHRP97 and IBC2000, a reliability/redundancy factor, ␳, is
used as a multiplier of the lateral design earthquake load. The
factor ␳ is defined in the codes as
472 / JOURNAL OF STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING © ASCE / MARCH 2007
J. Struct. Eng. 2007.133:471-480.
20
␳=2− in US customary units
rmax冑AB
共1兲
6.1
␳=2− in SI units
rmax冑AB
in which AB = ground floor area of structures 共ft2 or m2兲 and
rmax = maximum element-story shear ratio. As mentioned in the
foregoing, this factor has been criticized by practicing engineers
as well as academic researchers.
Based on ASCE 7-05 and NEHRP 2003, for steel moment
frames, redundancy factor ␳ assigned to the seismic force-
resisting system is either 1.0 or 1.3. For structures of Seismic
Design Category B or C 共determined by the seismic use group
and the design spectral response acceleration parameters, SDS and
SDl兲, ␳ may be taken as 1.0. For structures of Seismic Design
Category D, E, or F, the value of ␳ is permitted to equal 1.0
provided that each story resisting more than 35% of the designed
base-shear and meets one of the following conditions.
1. Loss of moment resistance at the beam-to-column connec-
tions at both ends of a single beam would not result in more
than a 33% reduction in story strength, nor create an extreme
torsional irregularity.
2. At each story is regular in plane with at least two bays of
primary seismic force-resisting elements located at the pe-
rimeter framing on each side of the structure in each orthogo-
nal direction.
Nine buildings with different plane configurations used as pro-
totype structure in the NEHRP 2003 proposal are designed for
reliability/redundancy analyses in this study. Results using the ␳
factor in ASCE 7-05/NEHRP 2003 and the RR factor are
compared. The suitability of a uniform penalty factor of 1.3 is
examined.
Uniform-Risk Redundancy Factor
Wang and Wen 共2000兲 introduced a uniform-risk redundancy fac-
tor, RR, for design to achieve a uniform reliability level for build-
ings of different redundancies. This factor can also be used to
evaluate the redundancy of a given structural system. The RR
factor is defined as the ratio of spectral acceleration causing in-
cipient collapse of a given structure to that corresponding to an
allowable probability. The RR factor is defined as follows:
冢 冣
1 when Pic 艋 Pall
ic
RR = Sica 共2兲
when Pic 艌 Pall
ic
Sall
a
where Pic = actual probability of incipient collapse;
ic
Pall
ic = allowable probability of incipient collapse; and Sa and
all
Sa = elastic spectral acceleration at the fundamental period caus-
ing incipient collapse at these two probability levels. The elastic
spectral acceleration at the fundamental period has been used as a
seismic hazard intensity measure in earthquake engineering. It is
suitable for two-dimensional analysis of structures under uniaxial
excitations. This study focuses on a 3D structural responses under
biaxial excitations in which the interactions between responses in
the two principal directions and torsional motion are important.
Thus, a more general ground motion intensity measure is needed
to take the 3D effects into account. Wang and Wan 共2000兲 found
the biaxial spectral acceleration 共BSA兲 to be an adequate measure
when biaxial response is considered. Therefore, BSA, defined as
 the maximum value of the vector sum of the accelerations of a
single degree of freedom system in the two orthogonal directions
throughout time history analysis, is used.
In FEMA 273 共1997兲, a desirable goal for rehabilitation is to
achieve the basic safety objective by satisfying the following re-
quirements: Life safety under BSE-1 共10% in 50 years兲 earth-
quake and collapse prevention under BSE-2 共2% in 50 years兲
earthquake. In addition, the NEHRP Provisions Commentary
共FEMA 2004兲, developed by the Building Seismic Safety Council
共BSSC 2003兲, states that Group I 共essential兲 buildings should not
collapse under the excitation of maximum considered earthquake.
For most sites, the maximum considered earthquake is the same
as BSE-2. Therefore, the target probability of incipient collapse
ic 兲 in this study is 2% in 50 years as inferred from the previous
共Pall
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documents.
As shown in Eq. 共2兲, determination of the RR factor requires
the spectral acceleration corresponding to an allowable probabil-
a 兲 and the spectral acceleration causing
ity of incipient collapse 共Sall
incipient collapse 共Sica 兲. Shome and Cornell 共2000兲 found that the
dispersion of the displacement demand 关e.g., maximum column
drift ratio 共MCDR兲兴 at high intensity is very high 共coefficient of
variation ⬎1.1兲 and the lognormal distribution may not be the
most suitable model for the displacement demand when collapse
is considered. They proposed a three-parameter model to charac-
terize the distribution of displacement demand, in which the “col-
lapse” was considered separately using conditional probability. To
circumvent the problem of high dispersion of MCDR at high
intensity, in this study the RR factor is determined using the Sall
obtained directly at the collapse point of each single incremental
dynamic analysis 共IDA兲 curve and hence the regression analysis
of drift versus spectral acceleration is no longer needed. The Sica
can be determined by using the spectral acceleration correspond-
ing to the desired probability level for the collapse prevention.
This method has the advantage that incipient collapse capacity
in terms of Sa has less scatter because of the softening load-
displacement relationship observed in IDA curves. This will be
verified in the following numerical examples.
Design of Prototype Buildings
Prototype buildings are designed according to IBC 2000 共ICBO
1998兲 and the connection capacities against rotation are random-
ized as described in the companion paper 共Liao et al. 2007兲. Only
post-Northridge connections are considered.
Nine 3-story and nine 12-story buildings with different con-
figurations are designed according to IBC 2000 共ICBO 1998兲.
They are all square in plane with a length of 150 ft and five bays
in each direction. The story height is 13 ft. The plane configura-
tion, number, and arrangement of moment frames follow the pro-
totype designs recently submitted to NEHRP 共NEHRP Proposal
2-1 R兲 and adopted in NEHRP 共2003兲. These designs are used in
this study because they are proposed by engineers, and believed
to be commonly used in this country. They also allow a direct
comparison of the redundancy factors proposed in NEHRP 2003
and the uniform-risk redundancy factor proposed in this study.
The plane configurations of these nine different buildings are
shown in Fig. 1, in which the abbreviations of building types are
given and used throughout this paper. The abbreviations for three
3-story buildings are described in the following:
1. 3s-3bay-3bay: 3-story building with three moment bays in
both directions. Only the three center bays of the perimeter
Fig. 1. Nine plane configurations of 3- and 12-story buildings 共bold
a
lines represent the moment frames兲
frames are designed as moment frames. The rest are gravity
frames.
2. 3s-3bay-1bay/core: 3-story building with three moment bays
in N-S direction, and one moment bay in the E-W direction
in the core area. The three center bays of the perimeter
frames in the N-S direction and the center bay in the core
area 共E-W direction兲 are designed as moment frames. The
rest are gravity frames.
3. 3s-1bay/core-1bay/core: 3-story building with one moment
bay in both directions in the core area. Only the center bays
of the core area are designed as moment frames. The rest are
gravity frames.
The abbreviations of 12-story buildings follow those of 3-story
buildings.
Demand and Capacity Analyses
A modal analysis is performed for each of the 3- and 12-story
buildings and the structural periods and mode shapes are ob-
tained. The analytical results are then compared with measured
data of similar buildings to ensure that the design and the model
are appropriate. Time history analyses under the excitation of
SAC2 ground motions 共Somerville et al. 1997兲 are performed for
each building, and the following important factors are considered:
共1兲 uncertainties in material properties; 共2兲 uncertainties in con-
nection capacity; 共3兲 effects of gravity frames; 共4兲 P-⌬ effects; 共5兲
panel zone effects; 共6兲 brittle beam-column connections; 共7兲 in-
elastic column behavior; and 共8兲 effect of accidental torsion.
Table 1 shows the periods of all buildings. For the 3-story
buildings, the fundamental periods are from 0.72 to 1.3 s except
the 3s-1bay/core-1bay/core building. Yun 共2000兲 did a regression
analysis of the periods of buildings based on measured data from

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 Table 1. Periods of 3-Story and 12-Story Buildings 共Second兲
3-story 12-story

1st 2nd 3rd 1st 2nd 3rd

Building type mode mode mode mode mode mode
3bay-3bay 0.72 0.71 0.53 2.32 2.32 1.72
2bay-2bay 0.81 0.81 0.61 2.67 2.67 2.0
1bay-1bay 0.92 0.91 0.7 3.125 3.125 2.38
3bay-1bay 0.88 0.74 0.6 2.96 2.4 0.88
2bay-1bay 0.9 0.82 0.65 3.03 2.71 0.93
3bay-1bay/core 1.22 0.76 0.7 3.06 2.48 2.32
2bay-1bay/core 1.28 0.85 0.78 3.16 2.84 2.66
1bay-1bay/core 1.3 0.97 0.86 3.44 3.19 3.07
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1bay/core-1bay/core 3.85 1.35 1.05 12.5 3.53 2.83

Goel and Chopra 共1997兲 and showed that the median period of
3-story buildings is 0.7 s. The 3s-1bay/core-1bay/core building
has a much longer fundamental period 共3.85 s兲 in torsional mo-
tion due to the poor design as shown in Fig. 1. For the 12-story
buildings, the fundamental periods are from 2.32 to 3.44 s except
the 12s-1bay/core-1bay/core building, as compared with Yun’s
median value of 2.1 s. Again, the 12s-1bay/core-1bay/core build-
ing has a much longer fundamental period 共12.5 s兲 in torsional
motion. Note that all buildings satisfy the drift requirement in
IBC 2000 in each principal direction caused by lateral displace-
ments only.
Typical time histories of displacements in X-direction of
3-story buildings are shown in Fig. 2. As expected, as the number
of moment frames in building increases, the displacement re-
sponse of a building decreases. Therefore, a structure with more
lateral resisting elements will have better system reliability and
redundancy. From the time history response, oscillation periods
are calculated as 0.71, 0.71, and 0.59 s, respectively which agree
well with 0.72, 0.71, and 0.53 s shown in Table 1. As a 3D analy-
sis is performed in this study, the first three periods of a building
can be considered as the fundamental period in the corresponding
building motions. The roof motion is apparently dominated by
these modes.
Results of the dynamic time history analysis for all 12-story
buildings indicate that the number of moment frames significantly
affects the building response as in the 3-story buildings. From the
time history response of the three directions, the oscillation peri-
ods at the roof level are calculated as 1.67, 1.67, and 1.0 s in
X-direction, Y-direction, and rotation about Z-axis, respectively as
compared with the three fundamental periods of 2.32, 2.32, and
1.72 s shown in Table 1. Apparently, the fundamental modes do
not dominate the structure response for midrise steel frames; the
higher modes have significant contribution on the overall re-
sponse. The results also indicate that the BSA based only on the
first mode may not be the most suitable measure of ground mo-
tion intensity for evaluating response of mid-rise steel buildings.
Investigation of the effects of higher modes on structural response
and consideration of higher modes in the BSA is carried out in the
following.

Table 2. Statistics of MCDR Demand on 3-Story Buildings at Two

Hazard Levels
10/ 50 2 / 50

Median Median
Building type 共%兲 COV 共%兲 COV
3bay-3bay 1.91 0.31 3.29 0.4
2bay-2bay 2.39 0.29 3.76 0.87
1bay-1bay 3.13 0.51 4.62 0.42
3bay-1bay 2.4 0.35 4.2 0.55
2bay-1bay 2.69 0.39 4.35 0.61
3bay-1bay/core 2.81 0.41 7.16 0.77
2bay-1bay/core 2.8 0.37 6.9 0.5
1bay-1bay/core 3.17 0.32 9.13 1.03
Fig. 2. Roof displacement histories of 3-story buildings in Y共N-S兲 1bay/core-1bay/core 4.28 0.3 16.23 2.17
direction Note: COV= coefficient of variation.

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 Table 3. Statistics of MCDR Demand on Each 12-Story Building at Two Table 5. Statistics of Demand on 12-Story Buildings in Terms of BSA
Hazard Levels
10/ 50 2 / 50
10/ 50 2 / 50
Median Median
Median Median Building type 共g兲 COV 共g兲 COV
Building type 共%兲 COV 共%兲 COV
3bay-3bay 0.43 0.33 0.86 0.4
3bay-3bay 2.4 0.14 4.34 0.31 2bay-2bay 0.38 0.33 0.69 0.41
2bay-2bay 2.62 0.21 5.15 0.28 1bay-1bay 0.32 0.4 0.55 0.41
1bay-1bay 3.30 0.15 7.04 0.53 3bay-1bay 0.36 0.37 0.65 0.48
3bay-1bay 2.82 0.2 5.1 0.45 2bay-1bay 0.35 0.42 0.64 0.46
2bay-1bay 2.84 0.19 6.5 0.47 3bay-1bay/core 0.37 0.36 0.63 0.48
3bay-1bay/core 3.61 0.26 8.6 0.43 2bay-1bay/core 0.35 0.4 0.62 0.46
2bay-1bay/core 3.79 0.25 9.1 0.41 1bay-1bay/core 0.28 0.46 0.48 0.35
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1bay-1bay/core 4 0.15 11.5 0.55 1bay/core-1bay/core 0.25 0.45 0.44 0.36

1bay/core-1bay/core 4.76 0.13 11.48 0.87 Note: BSA= biaxial spectral acceleration and COV= coefficient of
Note: MCDR= maximum column drift ratio and COV= coefficient of variation.
variation.
Capacity Analysis via Incremental Dynamic Analysis
Demand Analysis
Ten pairs of SAC ground motions 共LA21–LA40兲 are used as ex-
To evaluate the probabilistic demand on a building, SAC Phase 2 citations in the IDA analyses. Fig. 3 shows a typical result of the
ground motions corresponding to probability level of 2 and 10% IDA. The IDA curves flatten after a transition point 共shown by
in 50 years are used as earthquake excitations. A suit of ten square points兲 indicating instability. The transition point therefore
ground motions are used for time history analyses for each prob- can be used to mark the structural capacity against incipient col-
ability level, and the median value of the MCDRs is used as a lapse. Fig. 4 shows the capacity distribution in terms of MCDR
measure for demand corresponding to each probability level. The and data points of the 3s-3bay-3bay building plotted on a lognor-
50-year probabilistic demand curve can then be determined from mal probability paper. The fit is reasonably good, therefore a log-
these two median values assuming a lognormal distribution. To normal distribution is used for the capacity. The median capacity
include the effect of modeling error, a correction factor described
in the companion paper is used. Tables 2 and 3 show the median
MCDRs of each 3- and 12-story buildings at the two probability
levels. The demand increases at both probability levels when the
number of moment frames decreases. Alternatively, the BSA cor-
responding to the desired probability level can also be used as a
measure of demand. Tables 4 and 5 show the statistics of demand
in terms of BSA. The COVs of the demand in terms of MCDR
vary from 0.4 to 2.17, similarly to the observation of Shome and
Cornell 共2000兲. The COVs of the system demand in terms of BSA
vary from 0.2 to 0.37. Therefore using BSA as the response mea-
sure can effectively reduce the randomness in the demand.
Responses of 3- and 12-story buildings of different floor areas
and otherwise the same configurations were found not signifi-
cantly different. Also the number of stories has only a moderate
influence on the building response.

Table 4. Statistics of Demand on 3-Story Buildings in Terms of BSA

10/ 50 2 / 50

Median Median
Building type 共g兲 COV 共g兲 COV
3bay-3bay 1.37 0.32 2.51 0.35
2bay-2bay 1.29 0.29 2.34 0.34
1bay-1bay 1.18 0.25 2.14 0.35
3bay-1bay 1.27 0.34 2.42 0.37
2bay-1bay 1.23 0.28 2.34 0.35
3bay-1bay/core 1.14 0.32 2.08 0.2
2bay-1bay/core 1.1 0.23 1.81 0.33
1bay-1bay/core 1.05 0.27 1.66 0.34
1bay/core -1bay/core 0.66 0.44 1.06 0.31
Fig. 3. IDA curves of 3-story buildings 共solid points represent
Note: BSA= biaxial spectral acceleration and COV= coefficient of
variation. collapse points兲

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J. Struct. Eng. 2007.133:471-480.

 statistics. The results of structural capacity in terms of BSA
against incipient collapse are also shown in Table 6. There is a
clear trend of decreasing capacity with decreasing number of mo-
ment frames.

Building Redundancy Analysis

The RR factors for 3-story buildings, in which the MCDR is used

to measure system demand and system capacity are calculated
and shown in the second column of Table 7. It is seen that as
expected, buildings with more moment frames have a larger RR
factor, and hence, more system redundancy. The RR factors for
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3-story buildings based on BSA are also calculated and shown in

Fig. 4. Building drift 共%兲 ratio capacity against incipient collapse
with post-Northridge connections plotted on log-normal probability
paper
and coefficient of variation of each building are then calculated
using lognormal assumption and the statistics are shown in Table
6. Results indicate that the capacities in terms of MCDR do not
show any clear dependence on the number of moment bays. Al-
ternatively, system capacity can be described in terms of BSA.
Again, the lognormal assumption is used to calculate the BSA
the third columns in Table 7 for comparisons. The results are
similar with larger difference between two methods for smaller
RR. The system demand in terms of MCDR generally shows
larger dispersion which leads to larger difference in the resulting
RR factor and hence explains the difference in results using these
two different measures for demand and capacity. The RR factors
for 12-story buildings based on BSA are shown in the fourth
column of Table 7. The relationship between the number of mo-
ment frames and RR factors is similar to the results of 3-story
buildings. The 1 / RR factors of the 12-story buildings are a little
larger than those of the 3-story buildings even though the plane
configurations are the same. The NHERP 2003 ␳ factor is shown

Table 6. Statistics of Building Capacity against Incipient Collapse

3-story 12-story

MCDR BSA BSA

median MCDR median BSA median BSA
Building type 共%兲 COV 共g兲 COV 共g兲 COV
3bay-3bay 6.3 0.37 4.7 0.34 1.12 0.43
2bay-2bay 6.9 0.19 3.86 0.31 0.69 0.32
1bay-1bay 4.86 0.64 2.31 0.62 0.53 0.52
3bay-1bay 5.97 0.31 3.53 0.46 0.66 0.31
2bay-1bay 6.08 0.18 3.12 0.44 0.68 0.42
3bay-1bay/core 6.37 0.23 2.34 0.42 0.6 0.37
2bay-1bay/core 7.43 0.15 2.17 0.4 0.51 0.4
1bay-1bay/core 6.6 0.31 1.7 0.55 0.45 0.61
1bay/core-1bay/core 7.06 0.24 0.94 0.35 0.35 0.5
Note: MCDR= maximum column drift ratio; BSA= biaxial spectral acceleration; and COV= coefficient of variation.

Table 7. Comparison of Uniform-Risk Redundancy Factor 共1 / RR兲 and ␳ Factor

1 / RR 1 / RR 1 / RR
3-story 3-story 12-story ␳ ␳
Building type 共MCDR兲 共BSA兲 共BSA兲 共Whittaker兲 共NHERP兲
3bay-3bay 1 1 1 1 1
2bay-2bay 1 1 1.15 1.16 1
1bay-1bay 1.26 1.2 1.47 1.41 1.3
3bay-1bay 1 1 1.14 1.41 1.3
2bay-1bay 1 1 1.19 1.41 1.3
3bay-1bay/core 1.64 1.12 1.28 1.41 1.3
2bay-1bay/core 1.27 1.09 1.49 1.41 1.3
1bay-1bay/core 2.11 1.28 1.67 1.41 1.3
1bay/core-1bay/core 2.41 1.39 1.69 1.41 1.3
Note:Values are calculated from the worse case in two orthogonal directions; MCDR= maximum column drift ratio; and BSA= biaxial spectral
acceleration.

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J. Struct. Eng. 2007.133:471-480.

 Table 8. Statistics of Regression Analysis of 1 / RR Factor on the Number
of Moment Frames
Variable ␤ P value Intercept
X1 1.6396 3.6E − 8 0.251 0.82
X2 0.03 0.00412
in the last column for comparison. It is seen that the ␳ factor
works well for the 3-story buildings based on BSA but it under-
estimates the force required for the 12-story buildings with small
number of moment frames. The results show that the ␳ factor may
not be able to prevent potential serious damage in nonredundancy
structures, particularly for poorly designed structures such as the
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1bay/core-1bay/core building. Also, obviously there is room for
improvement in the uniform penalty 1.3 for all nonredundant
buildings disregarding the layout and number of moment frames
and stories. The effect of floor area on redundancy was found to
be very small. The increase in design force due to the NHERP
1997 ␳ factor cannot be justified.
Regression Analysis of Uniform-Risk Redundancy
Factors
For practical application, it is of interest to investigate whether
the uniform-risk redundancy factors 共RR兲 can be determined by
important structural configuration attributes such as number of
moment frames and number of stories. In the study of simple
parallel ductile systems under static load 共Liao and Wen 2004兲,
the redundancy, defined as the ratio of the reliability index of a
component to that of a system, can be expressed as a function of
square root of the number of components. From Table 7, 1 / RR
increases slightly as number of story increases. To determine RR
factor as a function of number of moment frames and number of
stories, therefore, the following simple form is used in a regres-
sion analysis
1 Based on these results, 1 / RR factor can be constructed, as shown
Y = ␤0 + ␤1
冑X1 + ␤2X2
in which Y = 1 / RR; X1 = number of moment frames in a structure;
and X2 = number of stories. The resulting regression equation is
1
Y = 0.251 + 1.6396
冑X1 + 0.03X2
The regression analysis statistics are shown in Table 8. The R is
0.82, indicating that 82% of the data variability can be explained
by this model. Details of the regression analysis can be found in
共Liao and Wen 2004兲. Eq. 共4兲 may be useful for setting 1 / RR
values in code procedures.
Efficient Seismic Excitation Intensity Measures
The efficiency of an alternative excitation intensity measure 共IM兲
which is the sum of spectral acceleration at the first and second
modes, in conjunction with IDA is investigated. For mid-rise or
high-rise steel frame buildings, higher modes have significant
contribution in the overall structural response. Luco and Cornell
共2006兲 investigated six different IM of seismic hazard, including
the elastic response of the first two modes and the inelastic re-
sponse of the first mode, using “efficiency” and “sufficiency” as
the criteria for selection of an IM. Efficiency denotes a small level
of the uncertainty in demand measure 共e.g., drift response兲 for a
given intensity measure and sufficiency denotes the independence
J. Struct. Eng. 2007.133:471-480.
Table 9. R2 for 12-Story Buildings
R2
R2
Building type BSA SBSA
3bay-3bay 0.38 0.41
2bay-2bay 0.17 0.44
1bay-1bay 0.05 0.11
1bay/core-1bay/core 0.12 0.38
Note: BSA= biaxial spectral acceleration and BSA= combination of
biaxial spectral acceleration at first two modes.
of the demand measure on other parameters of ground motion,
such as magnitude and distance. They found that the elastic spec-
tral acceleration or displacement at the fundamental period does
not necessarily satisfy these two criteria. This is especially true
for buildings with long periods where higher modes may make
significant contribution in seismic response.
A combination of the bi-axial spectral acceleration of the first
two modes of the 12-story steel frames is proposed as follows:
SBSA = BSA1 + BSA2 共5兲
in which, BSA1 and BSA2 represent the BSA at the fundamental
period and the second period of the structure, respectively. A good
IM is expected to be a good prediction of the structural response,
i.e., MCDR. The power law is used to describe the relationship
between MCDR and two different IMs for comparison; BSA1 and
SBSA. Table 9 shows the R2 value for some of example designs.
The results show that including the BSA at the second period
gives larger R values indicating improvement in the prediction of
the structural response for a taller building with a long period;
though the scatters of the MCDR remain large 共the R2 is below
0.5 for all cases兲.
The results of system demand and system capacity analysis of
12-story buildings in terms of SBSA are shown in Table 10.
共3兲 in Table 11. The results show a similar trend observed in the
results using BSA. However, the RR factor drops for some build-
ings, e.g., the 1bay/core-1bay/core building 共from 1.69 to 1.37兲.
The regression analysis of Y = 1 / RR on the number of moment
frames X1 gives
共4兲
Y = 0.5848 + 1.2124
1
共6兲
2
冑X1
The predicted values of 1 / RR factors based on Eqs. 共4兲 and 共6兲 are
compared in Table 12. The difference is insignificant except when
the number of moment frames is small. The results also indicate
that for adequate redundancy, i.e., RR = 1, the total number of mo-
ment frames for a redundant building should be not less than nine.
In other words, for a moment frame system with an identical
number of perimeter moment bays in each direction, at least three
moment bays in one frame are needed to have adequate
reliability/redundancy against incipient collapse.
Fragility and Probability of Incipient Collapse
The fragility and risk analyses of incipient collapse are also car-
ried out for the prototype buildings. For a given building, the
incipient collapse 共IC兲 probability under earthquake hazard over a
given time period 共e.g., annual or 50 years兲 can be expressed as
follows:
JOURNAL OF STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING © ASCE / MARCH 2007 / 477
 Table 10. Statistics of Demand and Capacity of 12-Story Buildings in Terms of SBSA
Demand Capacity

10/ 50 2 / 50

Median Median Median

Building type 共g兲 COV 共g兲 COV 共g兲 COV
3bay-3bay 1.75 0.24 3.31 0.23 4.3 0.43
2bay-2bay 1.59 0.19 2.93 0.25 3.1 0.33
1bay-1bay 1.44 0.22 2.44 0.25 2.31 0.32
3bay-1bay 1.63 0.2 3.09 0.25 3.5 0.36
2bay-1bay 1.57 0.18 2.65 0.26 2.9 0.33
3bay-1bay/core 1.62 0.21 3.07 0.26 3.0 0.35
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2bay-1bay/core 1.56 0.19 2.63 0.26 2.7 0.45

1bay-1bay/core 1.38 0.23 2.18 0.25 2.1 0.39
1bay/core-1bay/core 1.21 0.21 2.05 0.28 1.72 0.3
Note: COV= coefficient of variation.

PIC = 冕 P共IC兩D = d兲f D共d兲dd 共7兲

where D = system demand, a random variable, and P共IC兩 D = d兲 is
the conditional probability of incipient collapse given D = d, or the
fragility curve. f D共d兲 = density function of D. For evaluations of
building fragility under earthquake excitations, a commonly used
system demand is annual or 50-year maximum spectral accelera-
tion at the fundamental period of the building; e.g., IBC2000
共Wang and Wen 2000兲. The fragility curve of a structural system
is therefore a function of the demand, system capacity and its
uncertainty. As shown above, the capacity uncertainty can be
modeled by a lognormal distribution based on the results the IDA
analysis. Figs. 5 and 6 show the fragility curves of 3-story build-
ings and 12-story buildings.
The system demand can be also approximately described by a
lognormal variable which allows solution of Eq. 共7兲 in closed
form

冉 冊
Table 11. Comparison of SBSA-Based Uniform-Risk Redundancy
Factor 共1 / RR兲 with NEHRP ␳ Factor for 12-Story Buildings ␭␪
PIC = 1 − ␾ 共8兲
Building type 1 / RR ␳ ␨␪
3bay-3bay 1.0 1 in which ␾ = standard normal probability integral; ␭␪ = ␭C − ␭D;
2bay-2bay 1.1 1 ␨2␪ = ␨2C + ␨D2 ; ␭C = E共ln C兲; ␭D = E共ln D兲; ␨C = ␴ln C; ␨D = ␴ln D;
1bay-1bay 1.23 1.3 C = system capacity; and D = system demand. Note that the
3bay-1bay 1.05 1.3 epistemic uncertainty is not considered in evaluation of Eq. 共8兲.
2bay-1bay 1.1 1.3 Table 13 shows the 50-year incipient collapse probability of 3-
3bay-1bay/core 1.2 1.3 and 12-story buildings. Notice the rapid increase in the IC prob-
2bay-1bay/core 1.29 1.3 ability as number of moment frames drops and it exceeds 20% for
1bay-1bay/core 1.33 1.3
the building with only one moment frame in each direction, for
both 3- and 12-story buildings. Only two of the eight buildings
1bay/core- 1.37 1.3
1bay/core meet the target 2% in FEMA/SAC study. When the uniform-risk

Table 12. Comparison Regression Results of 1 / RR Using BSA and

SBSA
Number of 1 / RR from 1 / RR from
moment Eq. 共4兲 Eq. 共6兲
frames 共BSA兲 共SBSA兲
2 1.63 1.44
3 1.42 1.28
4 1.30 1.19
5 1.21 1.13
6 1.14 1.08
7 1.09 1.04
8 1.05 1.01
9 1.02 1.00
10 1.00 1.00
11 1.00 1.00
12 1.00 1.00
Note: BSA= biaxial spectral acceleration and BSA= combination of
biaxial spectral acceleration at first two mode. Fig. 5. Incipient collapse fragility curves of 3-story buildings

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J. Struct. Eng. 2007.133:471-480.


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Fig. 6. Incipient collapse fragility curves of 12-story buildings
factor 1 / RR shown in Table 7 is applied to the design force, the
2% requirement is met for all buildings.
Summary and Conclusions
Structural redundancy under seismic loads was studied. A frame-
work for performance evaluation and design for redundancy was
developed. The main features of this framework consist of: 共1兲 the
MCDR and BSA are used as a measure of both the demand and
the capacity of a given building; 共2兲 capacity against incipient
collapse and its uncertainty are determined via 3D IDA; 共3兲 un-
certainties in demand and capacity are taken into consideration;
and 共4兲 a uniform-risk redundancy factor, RR is developed for
design to achieve a uniform reliability level for buildings of dif-
ferent degrees of redundancies.
Nine 3-story and 12-story prototype steel frame buildings with
different numbers and layouts of moment frames designed ac-
cording to current building codes are investigated. The RR factors
for these buildings are calculated and compared with the ␳ factor
in NEHRP 2003. Fragility and incipient collapse probability
analyses were also carried out and the structural reliability was
examined. Based on the numerical results, the following conclu-
sions are drawn:
1. The number of moment frames has a significant impact on
the MCDR demand on structures. The demand is smaller for
buildings with more moment frames. However, it has only a
moderate impact on the system MCDR capacity against in-
cipient collapse.
2. BSA was proven to be a more efficient measure for demand
and capacity against incipient collapse than the MCDR when
determining the RR factor. Using BSA one can avoid the
Table 13. 50-Year Incipient Collapse Probability of 3- and 12-Story
Buildings
Number of stories
Building type 3 12
3bay-3bay 0.0073 0.029
2bay-2bay 0.013 0.062
1bay-1bay 0.107 0.123
1bay/core-1bay/core 0.223 0.246
JOURNAL OF STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING © ASCE / MARCH 2007 / 479
J. Struct. Eng. 2007.133:471-480.
regression analysis of MCDR on BSA and the associated
errors and reduce the randomness in the system demand.
3. The summation of spectral accelerations of both first and
second modes of a building, SBSA, can predict the structural
MCDR demand of mid-rise steel moment frames more accu-
rately than BSA.
4. The results of regression analysis of 1 / RR on number of mo-
ment frames and number of stories show that such a simple
relationship may be useful in developing design guildlines;
also at least three moment frames in each principal direction
are needed to ensure adequate redundancy and reliability.
5. The ␳ factor in NEHRP 2003 is a big improvement over the
NEHRP 1997 ␳ factor, nevertheless, the uniform factor of 1.3
could be further refined to account for the effects of different
number and layout of moment frames, interaction between
motions in two principal directions, and torsional motions
which can cause building instability.
6. The results of the fragility and limit state probability analyses
show that buildings with a small number of moment frames
are vulnerable and may not meet the FEMA/SAC target per-
formance criteria under future seismic excitations. They need
to be redesigned or strengthened according to the uniform-
risk redundancy factor to achieve the desired reliability level
against incipient collapse.
Acknowledgments
Support from the National Science Foundation under Grant No.
NSF-CMS 02-18703 is gratefully acknowledged.
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